Entrevista a Tuomas: Savon Sanomat

This Time Nobody Will Be Fired

Nigthwish's two year world tour will be over on Saturday. The band has played 196 concerts. Dark Passion Play was released two years ago and with it the band has reached a peg higher stages.

Audiences came bigger as did the amount of fans. Tuomas Holopainen has got new fans like Lemmy Kilmister from Motörhead, Steve Harris from Iron Maiden and Ozzy Osborne from Black Sabbath.

They have seen among the audience, for example, the Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi. And Britney Spears have used Nightwish's music as an intro in her gigs. She didn't ask the composer's permission, but this time it's not a problem.

- We're just flattered that they wanted to use our music, says Tuomas Holopainen.


The Abyss Was Passed

The now ending two year world tour has been both rewarding and tough for Nightwish. The tour has reached North and South America, Australia, Europe and Asia. Only Africa was missed. The new countries in the tour map are China, Latvia, Luxemburg, Ireland, Serbia and Croatia.

- These two years went fast. I remember it like yesterday when we went to the first training concert to Tallinn, says Tuomas Holopainen.

At that point Holopainen was slightly worried about how the audience receives Nigthwish and the new vocalist.

- Uppermost I now have a proud and happy feeling that we survived from the maelstrom. I'm happy that our audience was so open-minded that they gave us the second chance and that they arrived to concerts. It's a deep relief that we passed that abyss.

By abyss Tuomas Holopainen means changing Tarja Turunen to Anette Olzon. According to Tuomas Holopainen, Anette is now completely integrated with the band.

- I feel that during the last few months she has realized what this all is about and how to deal with it. Anette has improved all the time towards the end of the tour. The future of the band looks excellent.

And when the future looks good, this means that there won't be any dramatic news after the last concert in Hartwall Areena. All band members will continue in the band.

- This time we're going to have better feelings after the tour. After the Hartwall concert we have decided to have a huge party. Then we're going to reset the situation, go to separate ways and return together in the beginning of the next year. We want to take some distance to Nigthwish.

Holopainen himself goes sailing to the Mediterranean Sea for one week in the beginning of October. Soon after that he is going to spend a few weeks in Australia with his friends.


Heavy Price

Of course there are some bad moments too in the two year world tour.

- Some band members and technicians had mental breakdowns, because of the certain sad things in private life. In two of these about 200 concerts we had severe technical problems, but in the end we managed to play in those concerts too, says Holopainen about bad moments of the tour.

- Heavy tour will always have its price. In a big group of people there is always someone who have some problems. These things happen when you spend a lot of time on the road. People don't seem to be able to resist it. Some long-term relationships have ended and it's always sad. But despite the problems I'll grade this tour A-. These two years were an unbeliveable journey.

One thing Tuomas Holopainen promises to his crew.

- We will never again have as hard a tour. The next tour will be planned a bit easier.


The Band Has Been Prepared For Setbacks

The journey of Nightwish has been quite a fairy tail compared to many other bands. The band has become more and more popular after each album.

How would a band, that has always become more popular, even react if they had some setbacks?

- At some point we will have to face some setbacks and we have been prepared for it. So far, we've made six studio albums and we've always went forward. We agree that it's unbelievable, says Tuomas Holopainen.

- We've also been able to take new steps in the evolution of our music. We've always entered to some new territories without losing the soul of the band.

Tuomas Holopainen doesn't believe that Nightwish would be in a crisis if the later albums didn't sell as much as Once and Dark Passion Play that have sold about one million copies each.

- I would be more worried and depressed if I listened to the new album for the first time and realized that it's crap.

Dark Passion Play sold more than Tuomas Holopainen expected.

- It feels unimaginable that in this digital era it has sold 130,000 copies in Finland.

Globally the latest album has sold a bit less than one million copies. The previous album Once has sold a bit more than one million. Totally Nightwish albums have sold about 4 to 5 million copies.


Four Songs Ready

Four songs are ready for the new album. The album should be ready in autumn 2011 if everything goes as planned.

- In July we will begin to work with new material. Then we will have about ten months to finalize the songs. Now I've got a huge drive, all these ideas are making me crazy. I've never before been so excited about the new album, says Holopainen.

Tuomas Holopainen keeps the content of the new music a secret, but he is willing to open the curtain a little bit.

- One of the four new songs is something completely different for us. I've never done anything like that before, says Tuomas Holopainen.


Random Facts

- Each Nightwish album has been released as a vinyl version too.

- During the two year tour the band played 27 different songs and the maximum amount of songs in the one concert was 18.

- Tuomas Holopainen's own favourites are The Poet And The Pendulum and The Islander.

- The album's first hit Eva was played just few times because, according to the band, it works well only on the album.

- According to Holopainen, the highlight in this summer was Olavinlinna.

- The tour ends on Saturday, September 19 in sold-out Hartwall Areena in Helsinki.

- During the break Tuomas Holopainen will compose new Nigthwish music and play keyboards in Kotiteollisuus every now and then.

- Anette Olzon will start making her solo album.

- Marco Hietala will work with his Tarot band.

- Emppu Vuorinen will work with his Brother Firetribe band.

- Jukka Nevalainen will continue to manage the business side of Nightwish and the online shop.